September Faculty Senate Chair Blog

This has been a busy month for the Senate as we welcome new members and a new Executive Team. On September 5-7 I was able to travel to the Tri-Cities campus for the first time as part of our Senate outreach. At that visit, I met with the Faculty organization (RFO) and conducted the new Senator orientation with Secretary Hudelson via Zoom. We were pleased to see that both new and returning Senators took advantage of this opportunity to ask questions and review the functions and processes of the Senate. This event was recorded so please reach out if you did not see it and would like to review its content. Our orientation this year also featured links to resources regarding free speech at WSU (https://freespeech.wsu.edu/) as well as brief mention of public meetings law in Washington. The Senate Steering Committee and Executive team are completing Principio modules which review the Senate’s obligation and commitment to alignment with the law. The position of Senator is a significant obligation and including your constituents in deliberation and discussion is a key part of the Senate process. The Senate Steering Committee, which includes campus and committee representation as well as our legislative representative Steve Bollens (https://facsen.wsu.edu/steering-committee/) met on September 12 to help us guide the Senate agenda and process. In future meetings we plan to finalize and clarify the development of motions from the Senate, help form at least two new committees focusing on International Affairs and Faculty Compensation, and identify initiatives for future conversation and action. Finally, we held our first Senate meeting on September 19 where we welcomed our new Chair Elect Ken Roberts from the Spokane campus. On September 20 I presented our updates in Pullman to the Board of Regents and thanked Chair Lisa Keohokalole Schauer for her commitment to shared governance. We anticipate continued dialogue with Provost Riley Tillman at our upcoming Senate meeting regarding the year long overview of the Academic units and how Senate can engage and support this process with an eye on the key needs of faculty and the university. Thank you as always to our Senators for their service to the Faculty and to WSU.